In the current struggling economy of job cuts, pay freezes and ever increasing taxes, more and more new online entrepreneurs are starting their own work-from-home online businesses to supplement their income. These digital entrepreneurs can then start their escape plan from confines of their traditional day job, as their online business grows and becomes more profitable. They can enjoy a new lifestyle, working for themselves, when they want and from where they want.But online business success is not a guarantee. Just because you have a website and some products and services to sell does not mean that the sales and money will come rolling in. The fundamental key for any online business success is to have a list of customers who have bought from you, will buy again or are interested in what you have to offer and will buy from you in the future. This list, normally made up of names and email addresses, is your business. If you have no customers, you have no business.List Building for Online Business Success Entrepreneurs who sell products and services online are often known as affiliates. Some affiliates have lists with tens of thousands of names. Others may only have a few thousand. The affiliate,s online business success comes from the influence that he or she has on that list, not necessarily the number of people on it. If you have influence on a list of 500 people, it can be more valuable than if you have a list of 10,000 to whom you have no influence.
Do the subscribers on your list listen to you?
Do they act on what you suggest?
Do they care when your email arrives in their inbox?
Do you provide them with value?
Online Business Success comes from building a relationship with your listConsider this. Would you listen to a radio station that just broadcast advertisements? Would watch a TV channel that just showed commercials or read a newspaper that was only made up of advertisements. It is doubtful that you would. In the same way, if you are sending out emails and you just bombard your subscribers with hard sell messages, you readers will soon get tired of them and tune out.But if you have built a relationship with your list by providing them with relevant and valuable information, they wil start to realise that you have interesting things to say that provide benefit to them. Building a relationship builds trust. So when you recommend a product or service that you think is good, they will respect your judgement, investigate, and maybe buy, the product for themselves.Starting your list buildingSo if online business success comes from list building, how do you get people on your list in the first place?There are a set step of rules:
You have to drive potential subscriber traffic to a web page that enables people to sumit their name and email address
You have to offer something of value in exchange for their name and email address
Once on your list, you have to continually provide value to your subscribers.
If you want online business success, your list building process needs to be based on giving away helpful and informative information in exchange for a an established relationship. Most customers require 7 to 12 exposures to your products and services before they are going to consider making a purchase.Building an online business does involve work and effort. But it is important to remember that it costs far more to get a new customer in terms of time effort and money that it will to make a sale to a customer that you have already earned trust and a relationship with. As long as you can build a steady list of customers who keep coming back to you and you continue to look after them, you will find online business success.